


A Stupid Thing

by toyhto



Category: My Own Private Idaho (1991)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-19
Updated: 2017-05-19
Packaged: 2018-11-02 14:13:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10946208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toyhto/pseuds/toyhto
Summary: “I don’t know. I’d have just loved you. Day by day. See how it goes.”





	A Stupid Thing

**Author's Note:**

> This movie left me with heartache (which is generally what I go for in fiction, so job well done there) and so I had to write something.

_This is not real,_ he thinks as someone picks him up.  
  
“Hi,” Scott says to him. He can’t find words to answer with so he doesn’t. Scott still smells the same though, only it’s a memory, it has to be, he saw Scott in the funeral. And he saw Scott that morning in Italy. There was nothing left then, even if there was something in the first place of which he of course can’t be sure now. There might have been nothing all along.  
  
“This isn’t happening,” he says as Scott makes him sit in the passenger seat. He’s cold and he has lost his shoes. Scott has a new jacket that looks like it has cost plenty. He leans into the seat and looks at the road, no, he looks at Scott, no, the road, because Scott isn’t here. Scott starts the car. It’s loud. The road goes on and on but still it feels like they aren’t moving.  
  
“Alright?” Scott says a lot later when he has blinked a few times and suddenly the light is dim and they’ve pulled over. Also he’s cold. It’s weird to have Scott in his dreams, he thinks, because he knows every inch of Scott, he knows how Scott smells and now the smell is in his dream too even if it’s impossible. He inches towards Scott and Scotts takes a deep breath. Probably he has always known he kind of loves Scott. _Love,_ he thinks, _love love love,_ what a stupid thing. Now what he’s got left of it is that he can dream dreams that feel so real he’s probably going to start believing in them. Then he’s going to go insane.  
  
“Yeah,” he says, “alright.”  
  
“You’re cold.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Remember when we built the fire?”  
  
“Yeah.” Could he cry in a dream? Probably not. “I told you.”  
  
“What?” Scott asks but it sounds like it’s coming from somewhere far away. Fine. He can talk like this. Possibly he can talk now that Scott isn’t here anymore.  
  
“I love you,” he says, what a stupid thing to say, “I think I love you.”  
  
“You can’t know that.”  
  
“It’s like,” he says, “you’re the only thing that makes sense. Even a little. You’re the only thing in the whole universe that stops spinning.”  
  
“You aren’t making any sense.”  
  
“Fuck sense,” he says and it sounds like he’s out of breath. “I really wanted to kiss you back then.”  
  
“You think that would’ve worked?”  
  
“What you mean _would’ve worked?_ ”  
  
“I mean,” Scott says, and there’s a hand on his knee, a steady warm reassuring hand that always used to come through the mist of the dream, _oh this is a good one,_ he thinks. “What would’ve happened? Would you have? Really?”  
  
“Yeah,” although it really is too late. “I would have loved you.”  
  
“What does that even mean.”  
  
“I don’t know,” he says and laughs but it comes out all wrong, it’s too sharp, too worn and too breathless and he only sounds like he’s terribly sad. But he’s alone so it doesn’t matter. “I don’t fucking know. I might have found out.”  
  
“How?”  
  
“I don’t know. I’d have just loved you. Day by day. See how it goes.”  
  
“But what if it doesn’t work.”  
  
“I think I’d have wanted to try anyway.”  
  
“Fine,” Scott says. “I don’t know how long it would take to drive somewhere. We should lower the seats, try to sleep, all that.”  
  
“Yeah,” he says although he’s already asleep. He looks at Scott as Scott leans closer and lowers his seat for him, and his nose almost gets brushed onto Scott’s neck, almost, _almost_ , which kind of feels worse than _not at all._ He breathes in and out and now he’s lying on his side and Scott is watching him looking exactly like Scott even though it can’t be. He wants to lean in. Perhaps in a dream he could kiss Scott. But he doesn’t dare to.  
  
In the morning he’s alone and cold to the bone and then he turns his head and sees Scott pissing at the side of the road. “What the fuck?”  
  
“Morning,” Scott says and glances at him.  
  
“I was dreaming,” he says but can’t seem to make his voice work somehow.  
  
“I know,” Scott says and zippers his jeans. He stares at Scott’s hands. _Fuck fuck fuck -_  
  
“No,” he says, “I mean. You weren’t there.”  
  
“You hungry?”  
  
“No. Yes. Where’re we going?”  
  
“Home, probably. Shit this is going to be weird.”  
  
“What is?”  
  
“Explaining this,” Scott says, “that I came to get you. But you really were kind of in trouble.”  
  
“I don’t know what I said to you. Last night. If you were there.”  
  
“I was,” Scott says. “I don’t care.”  
  
“I care.”  
  
“I think we need to eat something.”  
  
“Scott.”  
  
“I know,” Scott says, “I know,” and walks to the car and opens the door and then just stands there until he stands up too. He can’t stand steady but fuck that. The wind keeps pushing Scott’s hair onto his face. He wants to kiss Scott but he can’t so he stays still until Scott hugs him.  
  
_Please please please_ , he thinks and it goes on.


End file.
